Fullmetal Gakuen
by rafayel-kun
Summary: AU. After an accident leaves them orphans, Ed and Al have to go to military school. In a dog-eat-dog world, is it possible to make friends... and find something more? And in this new world full of mystery, will they even survive? Edwin, Royai, Almei WIP
1. Arrival

A/N (the first and probably the only one you'll ever see): I don't own FMA. This story will incorporate characters from both the first anime and the manga/second anime. This a work-in-progress, meaning I'm just winging it. Any suggestions you'd like to make, feel free. I have all of the characters lined up in their respective slots, but any story ideas would be welcome, but that doesn't mean I'll be using them. I'll of course credit those who do submit ideas, seeing as I don't own the characters, I'm not going to be stingy about the rights to this story. I'm still not sure where I'll go with this, either make it angsty or just as humor. Maybe both. Either way, I hope you enjoy this fanfic of a not-so-ordinary high school life.

BTW, if there are any grammatical errors or misspellings (probably because I type so fast), feel free to point them out. Also, any other updates about the story's progress and all that jazz will be in my profile. It takes up too much space here. Ja ne.

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"...'nii-san?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm ready."

Edward gave a friendly squeeze to his younger brother's shoulder before they confidently walked up the grey marble steps. However, when they arrived at the imposing metal doors, the younger boy faltered again.

"...'nii-san?"

"...yeah?"

Alphonse swallowed nervously. "Do we really have to...?"

"Yeah."

The young boy took in a deep breath before steeling himself once more. "Okay."

Edward took a deep breath himself before rapping his knuckles against the door. Nothing happened for about a minute or so, until the door slowly creaked outward. The boys stepped out of the way and peered inside.

A man with a balding head and a very feeble mustache came out, his chest swelling. "You're late!" he yelled loudly, startling them both.

Edward scowled heavily, stepping forward. "Your so-called transportation broke down and we had to walk."

The man sniffed indignantly through his beak-like nose. "That is no excuse! Just wait until I tell the principal-"

There was the sound of someone clearing their throat and the man, pale enough as it was, paled even more as he turned around. "Oh, Principal Bradley, sir, I was just going to see you." He wrung his hands, cowering in place.

"That will be enough, Yoki. Please, let them inside," said a deep voice.

The door opened even more, showing a vast lobby glowing with fluorescent lights. The two brothers stepped in and the snivelling Yoki closed the door behind them. Alphonse was looking the place all over, unconsciously moving closer to his brother, but Edward was carefully watching the man in front of him.

He was tall, elegantly dressed in the blue military uniform, a sheath strapped across his torso, the sword balanced against his hip. He had slicked-back black hair and a painfully-maintained mustache. A black eyepatch covered his right eye, and the other remained closed. He was smiling politely at them.

"You must be the Elric brothers."

Alphonse looked up at him and nodded, speaking for them both. "I'm Alphonse, and this is my older brother, Edward."

Edward said nothing, just watched the old man. He looked like he was in his fifties, maybe sixties, but despite his grandfatherly appearance, his aura was extremely powerful. Ed couldn't quite put his finger on how this man made him feel, but he was more than a little uneasy.

"You are a little late, but that would be our fault. The other recruits are in the assembly hall, and you haven't missed anything yet. Follow me."

Alphonse immediately followed after, relieved that this man was so friendly. He looked around the bleak hallways curiously. Edward was right up behind him, but he didn't take his eyes off of the principal.

'What is awaiting us here... at Central Military Academy?' 


	2. Introduction

A few minutes later they arrived at another set of double doors. Yoki pulled them open with a bit of effort and bowed as the principal went past. He sneered at the boys as they followed the old man, and then he shut the doors behind them with a slam.

The room was huge and concrete. It was completely empty furniture-wise. There was a stage to the front also made of concrete, and there were three banners, two blue and one green, with the military's insignia, a strange dog-fish-looking chimera. There were a few people there also dressed in uniform, but not many.

There were other kids out on the floor, of various sizes and ages. Still, there weren't very many. With the inclusion of the two brothers, there were thirty-two. Edward and Alphonse were led over to the second platoon and made to stand in the back, completing the square.

The principal went over to the stage and climbed a set of rough concrete steps. He stood in the middle of the group of soldiers and looked out at the children, his hands behind his back.

"Now that we are all here, I would like to welcome you to Central Military Academy. Some of you are here by choice... and some of you were not given a choice." Edward narrowed his eyes at this comment. "Either way," the principal continued, "You are all here, and you are now and forever more seen as equals." He paused. "There will be no distinction between physical dimensions, gender, or race. The only thing that will set you apart are your skills, and even then only to put you in the place you would work best."

He paced in front of the other soldiers, who stood there at attention, not even blinking or following his movements. "This first year you will be in training. There are twelve different classes you will be in, each of them for a month. While you are in each class, you will be evaluated on your skill in each subject. At the end of the year, you will all be divided into your respective skill class." He paused again. "I suggest you do your best in each class, recruits."

The principal stopped once again in the middle of the stage. "I shall remind you now that even if this is a school, this is also a training facility. You are being conditioned for military life after this school. Some of you are here as a punishment, and that punishment will end after your schooling. But those of you who have no future elsewhere, or you choose to stay with us, are welcome and urged to complete a military career."

Edward's brows furrowed. Urged? Were they that low on troops, that they had to condition children? What on earth had he and his brother walked into? The boy standing next to him, a dark-skinned boy with white hair and red eyes, sucked in a breath harshly, his eyes looking dangerous. Edward's attention was drawn to him. He was a young boy, maybe only about ten or so. So young to be here.

His attention was diverted when the old man called them to attention. They snapped to.

"Today you will have time to get to know one another in your barracks. Make sure to be on time in the chow hall for dinner at 1900. You're dismissed."

Apparently the other soldiers had schooled the rest of the children before hand because they all saluted. Edward and Alphonse mimicked them a few seconds later. Once the principal had left through the doors, they all released their salutes. A few braved a bit of chatter before the soldiers on the stage came walking down. Silence fell as the kids hesitated, not knowing what to do.

"Atten-hut!" said a woman, and they all stood at attention. She was very skinny, almost snakelike, with a head of closely-cropped blonde hair and one long wavy curl that hung in her face. A purplish-red tattoo of claw marks was on her left cheek, going down her neck to below her collar. "We will now split into genders and you will be led to your separate barracks. There you will stay until 0830, and then you will be led to the chow hall. Any questions?"

Silence.

"Good." She looked them all over. "Okay, the ten females, follow me."

When they wiggled through the ranks to join her, she gave them an icy glare. They froze. She made them go back into the ranks and then showed them how to move through the other recruits so as not to break ranks. They followed her in a single file line, more or less in-step.

Two male soldiers came up to what remained of the platoons. One of them was pretty short for a grown man. He also had a beak-like nose, like Yoki, but they were completely different otherwise. He was thick with muscle and had hair of two different colors, blonde on black, slicked back like a wind-blown bush. His eyes were crazed-looking as he sneered at them all.

The other was another man heavy with muscle, although a foot taller than the other. He was older, with thick white hair on his head and face, and extremely thick eyebrows. He seemed to have a permanent scowl on his face, and perpetually-crossed arms.

"You first eleven, come with me," the small man said, "And you better have paid attention to Martel when she showed the girls how to fall out of ranks."

The eleven boys hesitantly mimicked what the girls had done, following the beak-nosed man. The rest of them followed the silent one, Edward and Alphonse in the back.

They moved silently through the cold grey corridors. Edward did his best to remember the route. A left, a right, two lefts, another right, and then there were four doors in the one corridor. The silent man pulled open the second door on the right side and flicked on a light switch. The boys wandered in, curious.

The room was small and held four columns of three bunks, one column to each wall, two of the walls being longer to accommodate for the door they had come in and another door that led to somewhere. Their bunks were made of wood and each one had a rough woolen blanket folded on top with a flat pillow underneath. A dresser stood to the left of each column with three drawers. On the right side stood shelf with three slots.

The heavy man lifted his chin, pointing it towards a dresser. "Clothes." He gestured to the shelves. "Shoes." He pulled out a pocket watch and gripped it in his meaty hand. "1830."

And without another word, he left, shutting the door behind him. There was no sound of a key in the door, but they all felt locked in.

"Not a chap of much words, is he?" said a young boy, also looking about ten. He had brown eyes and blonde hair.

Another dark-skinned boy, although with dark hair, shrugged carelessly.

Two blonde boys, one older, stood close together. Edward figured they were brothers, as they shared the same blue eyes that held a slight purple tint to them.

"Um," said his own brother intelligently. All eyes turned to him. "Seeing as we're going to be together for awhile... perhaps an introduction?"

Finding something familiar to grasp onto, they all seemed to pull closer. All except for three.

"I'm Alphonse Elric," Al offered.

"Edward. I'm his older brother."

"Khayal," said the blonde boy with brown eyes that had spoken earlier.

"Russell Tringham," said one of the older blonde boys. He elbowed the smaller version of himself. "This is my younger brother, Fletcher."

"I'm Rio," said the dark-haired, dark-skinned boy.

"Rick," said the pensive white-haired one. "Rio is my brother."

A pale boy grinned, eyes closed. "Ling Yao. I'm from Xing."

"Xing!" exclaimed Fletcher, then flushed, suddenly shy again.

"Isn't that a long way away?" asked Khayal.

"Further than Ishval," replied Ling.

The two dark-skinned boys suddenly looked agitated.

As if he sensed the darkness in them, a boy that hadn't stepped forward did so. He placed both of his arms around the brothers. "Hey, now," he said in a lilting, whispering, high voice. "No need to get so upset."

He was tall, taller than Edward, with long dark hair that was distinctly green. Something about him made Edward feel like he'd been touched by something slimy. When he grinned, his teeth were sharp, and the smile didn't go to his indigo eyes.

Edward gestured with his chin, like the old heavy man had done, to him and the other two that hadn't spoken up. "And who are you? You seem to know each other."

The green-haired boy grinned. "No need to pry, chibi. All in good time."

Edward instantly gritted his teeth. He hated to be called short. He was aware of his vertical problem, he didn't need to be reminded of it.

Seeing Edward's angry face, the younger boys made themselves busy finding themselves their own bunks. The two in the corner didn't move at all. One was really short, looking only about six, if he was even that old. He had short cropped black hair and a distinct dot in the middle of his forehead. His skin was pale and his eyes were bored.

The other had long dark hair, an extremely dark shade of brown. His large eyes, like the green-haired boy's, were indigo. He, too, looked about ten or eleven. He suddenly looked to the side, locking eyes with Edward. His mouth opened slightly, showing sharp, pointed teeth.

Their gazes stayed locked for some moments before the nameless boy looked away. Edward scowled, his mood deteriorating. Being treated equal, my ass, he thought. Already there seemed to be a few that thought themselves superior. Perhaps these were the ones who elected to be here.

Either way, all of the boys here were young. None of them looked older than sixteen. Edward himself was fourteen, Alphonse thirteen. Russell looked about sixteen, his brother the same age as Al. Rio was about thirteen, his brother ten. Khayal, too, looked ten, or eleven. Ling was the oldest looking of them all, maybe even seventeen. Along with the nameless ones, who were about sixteen, eleven, and six, they were all so young.

'Why does the military need us here...?'


	3. Square

The heavy man came back to get them right at six-thirty. The boys jumped up out of their beds, where they had either been napping or spacing out or talking to their neighbors. The younger boys, other than the two strange ones, seemed to find it easier to make friends than the older ones did.

They all lined up in single file and marched after the old man. Edward became quite agitated. Did these soldiers even have names? Hell, he didn't even know the principal's name! Except for the female soldier, Martel, not one of them even uttered a moniker. He was tired of calling the men by simple names, his vocabulary wasn't exceptionally wide.

He was one of the first in line, not wanting to be trailing along behind. Figuring he really had nothing to lose, he asked, "So, what do we call you?"

The heavy man stopped abruptly, and the boys collided into one another, bumping heads. The old man turned Edward's way, staring at him with dark eyes. An uncomfortable silence fell.

"Roa."

He started walking again and they all hastened to catch up.

Roa, huh? A last name, a first, a nickname? Well, two names down... and so many more to go.

Even occupied with his thoughts, he still managed to memorize the way to the chow hall from the barracks. Roa shoved open another pair of heavy doors, revealing a long room filled with wooden tables that had benches attached to them. They split into two and made their way down to the end where the smell of cooked food came, and he gestured for them to stand at attention.

The other group of boys that had followed the small man came up behind them, and the girls led by Martel brought up the rear.

They stood there for quite some time, Edward guessed until it actually turned seven o'clock. Every minute that passed made him more and more agitated. He was starving. Circumstances being what they were, him and Alphonse hadn't eaten anything since breakfast, and they had arrived here at noon. Apparently they weren't the only ones-the boy on the other side of the table from him, Russell, grumbled something inaudibly. The smell of food, whatever it was, wasn't helping matters any.

Finally, the principal walked in. Some of the boys, the younger ones, unconsciously stood up taller. The man walked down the isle next to Edward and then to the front, to stand before them all.

"This is the chow hall. I trust you memorized the way, because there won't be anyone to escort you here tomorrow morning but yourselves. You are expected here promptly after morning activities, at 0700. Lunch is at 1300. Dinner is at 1900. The morning and evening meals last one hour, lunchtime for a half. After dinner, you are to return swiftly to your barracks. Revelry is at 0500. Get plenty of rest." He nodded at them. "I'd suggest eating everything, even if you don't feel hungry."

The principal then left the same way he came, and Roa, Martel, and the short man all saluted him. When he was gone, Martel took his place. "Those of you on the left side, you will get your rations first. Where you stand now won't necessarily be where you sit. Go through the line and then back to the table, standing in the furthest spot you can. Place your plates on the table and wait until everyone has their own, and then I will give the signal to sit. Talking will be kept at a minimum. Understood?"

"Yes," said a few boys, but mostly girls.

"I'm sorry?" she said, pretending to look troubled. She held up a hand to her ear as if to magnify the sound. "What did you say?"

"Yes, ma'am!" they all more or less shouted, the girls louder than the rest.

"That's... adequate. Okay, left side, go on up."

The food was, to put it politely, square. There was a square block of white stuff, square biscuits that looked squishy, a small square of what might have been meat, and a few smaller squares of green and orange. Even the juicebox was square.

When they were all supplied with rations and were standing at the table, Martel gestured for them to sit, and they sat. Edward looked around as he unfolded the napkin that held a single spoon. He was satisfied inside to see the green-haired boy stare in revulsion at the cubes on his plate.

His mood elevated, Ed dug his spoon into the block of what could have been meat and stuck a portion in his mouth. It was pretty much tasteless, with a hint of hamburger. The small orange and green cubes turned out to be carrots and peas, and the white one was potatoes. The biscuits were really biscuits, and they were indeed squishy. The juice was plain orange juice.

He was glad the food was pretty much lacking in flavor, instead of tasting like utter crap, like the way it looked. It made eating it that much easier. Sitting across from him, again, Russell nudged his younger brother, who was still staring at the cubes. He took a hesitant bite, and, realizing his hunger, started shoveling it into his mouth.

Alphonse, sitting next to his brother, was the first to finish. He had never been picky about food, and he wasn't about to start now.

Chatter was kept to a minimum, whether intentional or not. They were still wary of each other, barely more than strangers. The girls were a bit louder than the boys. Edward was somewhat envious of their ability to adapt easier.

He surreptitiously glanced down the line towards the girls. With about five other boys in his way, he couldn't see any of them clearly, but the first girl was a blonde with long hair pulled back in a ponytail. She had her elbows on the table and was spacing out. The girl across from her, a dark-skinned girl with dark hair said something, perhaps the blonde's name, and she looked up and then smiled.

Even though he'd seen Martel, he still couldn't believe women were in the military. Martel looked strong, able to take care of herself, but what he saw of these girls... they didn't seem to be able to hold their own if they were ever sent to the battlefield. Were they here by choice, or were they obligated to come here, like him and his brother?

He hadn't known he was staring until Alphonse elbowed him in the side. He choked on his spoon in surprise, looking at him. "What?"

"Martel just told us we have fifteen minutes left."

For the next quarter of an hour Edward half-listened to Fletcher and Alphonse holding a whispered conversation. The two had become friends quite easily. He found it uncanny how much they looked alike, aside from the different-colored hair and eyes. Flax and honey, sun and ocean.

"Alright," said the short man whose name he hadn't heard yet. "In the same way as you went up to the serving counter, go to the trashcan, and then back to the counter to drop off your tray."

When they had finished that and had made their way back to the table to stand, three men came into the cafeteria. All three of them were heavy with muscle, although one of them just looked plain fat. His face was mean, his skin dark like the one girl, his black hair in dreadlocks. A pale man with slicked-back blonde hair and a formidible mustache was the leaner of the three. The other was tanned with an impressive set of sideburns.

"Martel," said the fat one. "You are relieved from duty."

"Jelso," she said, nodding.

The others did the same. The small man was called Dolcetto. The pale blonde was Heinkel and the sideburned one was Darius.

Mentally noting them all in his mind, Edward followed the line as it took off behind Darius. Heinkel took the other eleven boys, and Jelso led the girls. The first door on the right side of the barracks corridor was where the other eleven went. The girls were in the second door on the left, right across from Edward's room. He noticed that Jelso did not go inside the room, being male.

"I'd suggest going to bed," said Darius. "That five o'clock revelry will be here sooner than you think." He left, shutting the door loudly behind him. Once more Edward felt a sense of being caged in.

As he took off his shoes and stuffed them on the shelf and climbed into the bottom-most bunk in his column, he wondered what tomorrow had in store for them. 


	4. Problems

Edward had always thought a revelry was a nice-sounding tune on a trumpet. Apparently, revelry here was a loud foghorn in a small room. At the noise, he jumped up in surprise, and hit his head on the bunk above him. Cursing the pain and the lights sparking behind his eyes, he hunched over and looked at the person in the doorframe.

He was enormous! How he even fit into his uniform, Ed would never know. Muscle covered every inch of him, and he was at least seven feet tall. He was also completely bald except for a lone blonde curl in the center of his forehead. If he thought the principal's mustache was meticulously kept, he was dead wrong. This mustache was the most epic of the mustaches he had ever seen.

The giant looked at them all, falling out of their bunks groggily, his beady blue eyes shining. "Good morning, recruits!" he called out joyfully, his voice an extreme baritone. "My name is Alex Louis Armstrong, your physical training instructor! Time to wake up and get your exercise clothes on!"

Not being able to fall asleep quickly the night before, Edward had investigated the dresser. There were three different outfits inside for each of them. One looked like a dressed-down version of the military uniform, without the medals and epaulettes, and was in a dark shade of grey. Another set of clothes was a pair of black workout pants and a black long-sleeved t-shirt. The other set was black as well, containing shorts and a short-sleeved t-shirt. There were also seven pairs of white socks, probably one pair for each day of the week.

He was one of the first to go to the dresser, ready to change out of the clothes he had worn yesterday and the night before. He felt gross, like he needed a shower. But he paused when he opened the drawer.

His body... he didn't want to show it to anyone, not the way it was now.

Edward waited for Alphonse to finish changing and gestured for him to come over. Al held up a blanket, trying to look inconspicuous, while his brother changed behind it. He hadn't had to ask why Edward wanted this to be done-he already knew.

Unfortunately, the grinning green-haired boy noticed.

"Whatcha hiding there, chibi? Something small?"

Edward's eyes narrowed dangerously and his scowl deepened, but he finished changing and pulled on a pair of white gloves he had brought with him, then stepped out from behind his brother. The rest of the boys had put on the shorts and t-shirt, but he had put on the pants and long-sleeved one. He took off his dirty socks, his back to them, and pulled on a clean pair, then his black boots that he had worn here. 'I guess they don't supply new shoes, too,' he thought, but that was fine with him. He loved these boots. They also kind of made him taller.

Armstrong made no comment about his state of dress, instead he opened his pocket watch. "Ten minutes. Tomorrow, let's work on five, shall we?" He stuffed it back into his pocket and then made for the other door in the room, the one that held a mystery on the other side. He unlocked the door and shoved it open, and the boys followed, hesitant once more.

It was a hallway, small and cramped (at least for Armstrong, which meant it was pretty roomy for the boys), and made of the ever-present concrete. One fluorescent light shone in the middle of it. There seemed to be another door in front of Armstrong, because they heard another key in a lock, and then they were outside.

It was still dark out, but the sun was starting to rise, casting a greyish pallor across what looked to be a parade ground. It was completely dirt with one tall tree in the middle. If all eleven of the boys had spread their arms and linked hands, they might have been able to surround the trunk.

Armstrong arranged them into half a platoon and put them at ease. Shortly after the other boys came through another door, and the girls came through another. Five boys fell into rank in the first platoon, and the rest of the kids formed another. Martel stood by the door the girls had come from, Dolcetto by the other. Roa was standing where Edward's group had come out.

Armstrong took out a clipboard from the folds of his shirt. It was small in his meaty hand. He scribbled something down on it and then turned his attention back to them.

All of a sudden, he whipped off his military jacket and posed, twisting his body so that they got an eyeful of his back muscle. A few of the kids in the front jumped back in alarm, a few girls gasped. Edward's eyebrow quirked up. So he really was all muscle. Disgustingly so.

"Children," he said in his deep voice. "As your physical training instructor, I will do my utmost to sculpt you-" he changed poses, turning back around and touching his fists together, flexing his biceps and triceps, "-into masterpieces of art! By the end of your education, you will all be beautiful creatures, beautiful enough to even rival me!" Another flex, one arm curled, the other punching the sky. His eyes glittered manically.

Silence.

But silence did not affect Alex Louis Armstrong. As if he had heard a giant round of applause, he went back into a normal standing position, using one hand to flick his one lock of hair back, although it went straight to its original position immediately after.

"Now we will begin stretching exercises!" He stuck his arms straight out to his sides. "Mimic me, my pupils! Spread out, let only your fingertips touch your neighbors'."

They all did as they were told, spreading out until only their fingertips touched. The ranks were ruined, in Edward's opinion. They might have been in rows, but they were uneven now, some of the kids having longer arms than others. It didn't faze their teacher.

"Arms down!" He flopped his own arms down. "And now that we all have enough personal space, so that we do not hit each other, we will stretch!"

He led them through some stretches, not wavering in his confidence or joyfulness in the slightest. Feeling thoroughly stretched out after five minutes, Edward wondered what would happen next. And if his body could handle it.

"Now, children, we will do some jumping jacks! Thirty, on my count, ready... One!"

Everything was going fine for Edward until number ten. Suddenly, his left leg decided it wanted to stay where it was. He fell sideways, but he caught himself with both of his arms. He gritted his teeth, pulling himself up back into a standing position. He tested out his left leg experimentally. It was working fine now.

When he went back to his place, he noticed that they had all stopped.

"Are you alright...?" Armstrong started, then faltered.

"Edward. Elric." Edward said, scowling. "Everything's fine."

Armstrong's eyes widened slightly before nodding. "As you were, recruits! Fifteen!"

His leg held up for the rest of the jumping jacks. They move onto push-ups, where they teamed up with a partner. Fortunately he got his brother Alphonse. After thirty, they switched positions.

"And... thirty!" They all stood up, dust all over their black clothes. Some left it there, others brushed it off. "And now, you will run around this parade ground ten times. I suggest you keep a steady pace all the way through. Sprinting will tire you and you will not be able to keep it up. This is not a race. Some of you are more fit than others, I have noticed that. It doesn't matter how bad you are at the beginning, only that you will improve as the days go by. Do your best, because you can't do any better. Line up!"

The children mingled in mob-like formation behind Armstrong against the inner wall of the grounds. Edward bit his lip, repeating a mantra in his head, hoping the words would go to his leg so that it would cooperate with him.

"You have an hour. As you proceed through the months, you will get faster, stronger. When you can all do this in under a half hour, you will have even more exercises to complete to ensure you do not get used to this, get soft to it." He cleared his throat, took out his pocket watch, waited a few seconds and then snapped it shut. "Start!"

They all took off, some faster than others, the green-haired boy actually sprinting. Alphonse stayed with Edward, Fletcher with Alphonse.

His leg worked fine. Three laps. Then it buckled beneath him and he sprawled on the ground. He caught himself yet again, tearing the glove on his left hand. He growled low in his throat. He shrugged off Alphonse and stood up on his own. Edward took an experimental step, then started running again. Fifteen paces away, he fell. Somewhat ready for it, he balanced himself so he fell right, colliding with the wall. He supported his weight on his right leg, panting.

"'nii-san..."

"Go on, Al. Finish."

His brother didn't move.

"Go!"

Fletcher tugged on his lookalike's arm and they started to run again. Alphonse keep watching his older brother out of the corner of his eye.

"My brother is the same, stubborn. I think you should let him go on his own," Fletcher whispered. Alphonse furrowed his brows, knowing that's what he should do, but he didn't want to leave his brother on his own. Fletcher had no idea what was wrong with him.

Edward pushed himself off of the wall, grabbing his left pant leg and lefting his leg up with great effort. As if the motion jump-started it, it started to work again. He hesitantly took a few steps forward, then started to run again.

This time when he fell, it was against someone else. They grunted in pain as he fell on top of them. He used his right arm to lift himself up and he rolled off of them.

Their eyes met and he blinked. They were blue, sky blue. Blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail, a black t-shirt that fit snugly across their chest-

"Are you alright?" she asked, curiously. "I've seen you fall a few times."

He furrowed his brows. She had beat him to the punch. Wasn't he the one who should be asking her if she was okay? He'd fallen on her, and she had broken his fall. But she stood up easily and brushed herself off. Edward sat back and tried to push himself up. A hand entered his vision and he looked up at her. She cocked her head to one side. Hesitantly, he took her hand and she pulled him up.

Suddenly, she gripped his hand, her eyes wide. "Your arm, it's..." And, as if something clicked into place in her mind, she looked down at his left leg. A hole in the knee, from his constant falling, showed her the glint of metal underneath. "Your leg, too?"

Edward hastily pulled his hand out of her grasp, leaned against the wall.

Armstrong popped up beside them, startling them both.

"What seems to be the problem?"

The blonde opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by Armstrong himself. "Limbs bothering you, Elric?"

Edward's eyes widened. "How did you-"

"Everyone knows your case, Elric. But it won't hinder you if you can master it." He gestured with his magnificently-muscled arms. "Go forth, young ward. You do not have to run, but you must at least walk, at your own pace."

"Sir, could I-"

"You may, Miss Rockbell. But go! Time is ticking away!"

And just as suddenly as he had appeared, he was gone again, sprinting up to the next group of kids in front of them, turning around and talking to them whilst running.

Edward ignored the girl and started to walk, slowly, feeling with his leg, trying to understand it, trying to figure out when it was going to collapse under him. The blonde walked beside him.

"Is that why you're wearing the winter clothes?" she asked.

He grunted in reply.

"Are you ashamed of them?"

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eyes. She was watching him curiously. Then he looked forward again, scowling.

"Yes. And it's none of your business."

"Do your bunkmates know?"

"No, and I'd like to keep it that way."

"Well, they're going to wonder why a perfectly healthy-looking boy is stumbling around while he exercises. They'll think something is seriously wrong with him. Like, rabies."

He turned to grumble something to her, but the words got lost in his mouth. "Rabies," he said instead, and then snorted, a smile flickering on his face. Then he grunted in pain, clutching his left leg mid-thigh.

"It wasn't connected right," she said, worriedly.

"Obviously."

She scoffed. "And what do *you* know about automail?"

"Absolutely nothing."

She pounced on the subject enthusiastically. Throughout the remainder of the ten laps, she stayed by him, talking his ear off.

'Figures. The first girl I meet is taller than me. And she's a grease monkey.' 


	5. Girls

Seriously, she wouldn't shut up.

Going on and on about different types of metals, and things with letters and numbers in their names that he could only guess were parts to automail. Nuts, bolts, screws. Wires.

In truth, he was glad someone else knew of his automail besides his brother, and, apparently, the soldiers here. But he felt it was just a matter of time before she started to pry into *why* he had automail in the first place.

Although, for now, she continued on her own tangent.

"And then, I accidentally put in a G-55 screw instead of a G-55.3 screw, and-"

"Hey," he said, interrupting her. Or trying to anyway.

"-then, the whole thing fell apart! Can you believe it? And there was this one time-"

"Hey," he said, a little louder this time.

"What?" she answered, looking angry, like, how-dare-you-interrupt-my-otaku-speak angry.

"I really don't care about automail, okay?"

She huffed. "Well, you should, seeing as you have two limbs that *are* automail."

He scowled and said nothing. He probably should learn basic stuff about it, but now was certainly not the time to start memorizing her affluent, cryptic speech. They were on lap eight, and he felt like this morning couldn't have been any longer than it was now. Some of the other kids had slowed down, started to walk as well, tired. Still, him and the girl were the last. The green-haired boy, of course, had finished, leaning against the wall and smirking at the rest of them. The long-haired boy with the identical eyes was sitting on the ground next to him, the six-year-old yawning boredly beside him.

"So, you should really have your leg looked at, by the way."

"I know that."

"By, you know, a professional."

"You don't say."

"How long have you had your automail? You don't seem very coordinated with it yet."

Edward sighed. See? He knew she was going to ask sooner or later. "...Not very long," he said truthfully, knowing it wouldn't help him at all to lie. He just had to skirt around the truth.

"I thought as much. Have you been to any kind of physical therapy?"

"For a month."

"A month!" she screeched, stopping in her tracks. "That's-that's-" She seemed at a loss for words, for once.

"Yeah, a month. And then I had to come here. So, now that we've established that my leg may or may not be broken, and that I was prematurely rereleased into the world, would you please shut up?"

She stared at him, eyes wide.

He ignored her, kept on walking. He stumbled slightly and she caught his elbow. He had the vague thought of 'Why the heck is she still here when I'm being such a jerk to her?' but he shrugged it away.

"I'm Winry Rockbell, by the way," she said, as if his last sentence had fallen on deaf ears.

"Edward Elric."

"I know, you said so earlier."

Right. When he had fallen during the jumping jacks and Armstrong had asked if he was okay.

As if taking his comment to heart after all, she kept her automail-speak to a minimum. She told him basic things he would need to do to upkeep his automail, stuff he could easily remember. Sometimes she would trail off and look at the sky. It had lightened considerably, the sun peeking at them above the walls of the parade ground. A breeze rustled through the thick foliage of the tree, making a sound like rain.

At the end of the tenth lap, they stopped in front of Armstrong. Everyone else had finished. It didn't seem to bother Winry that she was one of the last done. For Edward, he felt ashamed and weak.

The large man checked his pocketwatch and then clicked it shut. "0650. Perfect. Now, go back through the doors you came from and then to the chow hall. Do the same procedure you were taught yesterday and everything should be fine. Go!" he suddenly shouted, pointing at the door and flexing his arm at the same time. "Go, my children, go forth into the cafeteria, and eat until your heart's content, and then eat some more! For one day, you will look like me!" He posed again, one arm angled up, the other down.

Edward inwardly rolled his eyes. Armstrong was a basketcase, but he felt no malice from him at all. He was like an egotistical teddy bear. With muscles. Really, really gross muscles.

"'nii-san," came a voice, and Edward turned to it. Alphonse was standing behind him, looking curiously at the blonde-haired girl beside his older brother.

"Hey, Al."

"Ooh, you really do look alike," she said, staring back and forth between them. "Well, your colors anyway."

He turned away from her and rolled his eyes to his brother, who gave a small smile. They walked through the doors together. She had told them the door the girls had come through was the door at the end of the barracks corridor, since the girls didn't have an exit to the outside from their room. The went in that way and down the hallway, Edward leading the way with his keen memory.

"Are we really going to eat breakfast like this?" Winry asked, pulling at her shirt. They were all, indeed, very dirty and sweaty from their morning activities. Not to mention that they were starting to smell.

"Guess so," Edward said, not caring. He just hoped that there was a shower somewhere in his future, but right now his stomach was more important.

When they got to the chow hall, Winry left them to walk down the other side of the table. Yet, somehow, she was right across from Edward when they stood still. The dark-skinned girl from before was to her left, and an extremely short girl with two buns on each side of her head with three skinny braids sprouting from both, ending at about waist-length. Her eyes were slanted and she looked rather determined.

When they were all gathered in the chow hall, the principal made yet another appearance. He took his place in front of them again.

"Good morning, recruits. I trust your morning exercises were fruitful." He didn't pause to get an answer from anyone. "Today you will all be split up into three groups, each group going to a different teacher. The three subjects for this rotation are Marksmanship, Engineering, and Alchemy."

Edward heard groans corresponding with each, as well as gasps. He, himself, had grinned at the mention of Alchemy. So did his brother.

"You will rotate to a new class every month. After the three months, I will come forth and tell you the next three. Now, what I want you to do, is to call out a number, going from one, two, to three, and over again, down the line. Whatever number you shout, that's the group you will be in. Begin."

Edward froze. The two brothers locked eyes. They were going to be split up? Now? They had never been seperated before.

But he turned and shouted "Two!" and Alphonse "Three!" He tried to remain calm. He couldn't have a panic attack now, not like before, not in front of his brother. He knew Alphonse had broken down a few times since the accident. Edward had to be strong for him.

"Remember your number! First group is Marksmanship, second is Engineering, and third is Alchemy. These classes will take up the first half of your day, after which you will break for lunch. Military History will consume the next three hours, after which you will gain further instructions. Do your best, recruits."

He left them once again. Edward moved through the rations line in a daze, his heart pounding. He could only imagine what Alphonse was going through. They sat back down, still with Winry and the other two girls, only reversed and a little further along the table.

"What's with those faces?" Winry said, curious.

When neither of them answered, she nodded in understanding. "It's just for a few hours. I think you'll be okay."

Edward scowled.

The dark-skinned girl nudged Winry in the ribs. "Made some guy friends, I see."

Winry rolled her eyes. "These are Edward and..." she trailed off, her eyes widening. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't even introduce myself. I'm Winry."

Alphonse offered a small smile. "Alphonse. Edward is my older brother."

"Older!" squeaked the small girl beside Winry. "But he's shorter than you!"

Edward felt and heard an audible snap come from his plastic spoon. Silence reigned for a few seconds.

"I'm Paninya," said the dark girl, grinning. "I'm from Rush Valley."

Winry's eyes glazed over.

"I'm Mei. I'm from Xing," said the slant-eyed girl, munching on a squishy cracker.

"We also have someone from Xing in our room. His name is Ling. Do you know each other?"

Mei scowled, biting into her cracker rather hard. "Older half-brother," she finally said.

Paninya cleared her throat. "So, are you excited to finally start classes?"

"No," said Edward, at the same time that Winry said, "Yes". They stared at each other, and then he groaned, remembering the number she had shouted. Two, same as him.

"Well, of course *you're* excited, Winry, Engineering is your expertise," Mei rolled her eyes.

"Well, you seemed rather happy about getting Marksmanship, Mei," Winry grinned. Mei smiled back.

Paninya sighed. "As for me, I know nothing about Alchemy. I've never even tried it."

"That's okay," said Alphonse, piping up. "I can help you out with it."

Paninya grasped his hands, teary-eyed. "Promise?"

Al blinked in surprise and smiled. "Of course."

Winry was smiling mischievously at Edward. He looked at her weirdly before starting to eat his breakfast. Alphonse had a potential friend to be with in his class, someone he could help out, which was what he did best. This made Edward feel a lot better about the seperation, but he was still a little on-edge.

And it didn't help that Winry was still smiling at him. He had no idea why she was, and it was creeping him out.

Breakfast was in squares, again. A pancake square, a completely-solid syrup-square that was more like maple candy that anything, an egg square, two small bacon squares, and another square juicebox of orange juice. He wondered what kind of variety of food there was here, or if they ate the same thing over and over again.

Breakfast finished, they threw away the leftovers and replaced their trays, went back to the table. Dolcetto, Roa, and Martel came up to them.

"Showertime," Martel chimed up, taking the girls and leading them away. The boys followed Dolcetto and Roa. They went first to the barracks corridor to get a change of clothes, the dull grey uniform. Then they took a right into another hallway. Edward saw the last of the girls go into one room, and the door shut and locked. The two men led them to the room next door.

"You're lucky they put shower curtains up this year," Dolcetto said with a grin. "Enjoy your shower, midgets."

And behind a dirty shower curtain, Edward did. The scum he didn't mind, it hid him from view. And becoming clean once more felt glorious. For the first time since he had come here, he finally relaxed and let the metallic-smelling water wash all of his worries down the drain. 


	6. Sparks

Even though he knew both of them had someone to talk to in the upcoming classes (although, in his case, it was more like being talked at), he was still extremely pensive when they separated. Martel took the kids who had Alchemy, Roa took the ones for Marksmanship, and Dolcetto led Edward and the others towards Engineering.

The uniform he had on was loose but comfortable. It had that certain feel to it, like it had been used before and was softer from that use. Their dirty exercise clothes were taken away and he only had time to wonder what they would wear the next morning if that was the only pair of clothes they had, when they were pulled into their respective groups and taken away.

Edward shifted his wet hair over his shoulders and let it hang there along his spine. It was almost to midback now. He would have put it in his usual braid, but he wasn't used to his right automail arm yet and couldn't work the fingers correctly to do it; Alphonse had pretty much been braiding his hair for the past month. Some of the shorter strands disobeyed him and fell back across his collarbone, dampening the grey shirt he wore.

Winry had let hers go free as well, to drip-dry. He noticed the girls wore the exact same things as the boys, even the exercise shirts. No wonder it had looked so tight around her chest... wait, why was he thinking of that? He flushed as he remembered falling on top of her. It hadn't been graceful or suggestive at the time, but she had been really soft.

The blonde nudged him with her elbow and he jumped slightly.

"You alright? Your face is red."

"I'm fine," he said, scowling.

She shrugged, but stayed by him. He noticed that a lot in the past few days, kids latching onto other kids, to have a friend or someone familiar. Alphonse had latched onto Fletcher. He didn't know how he felt about this girl clinging to him, but he would deal with it. For now.

"Hey, Ed, about the teacher-"

"Quiet back there," Dolcetto growled.

Edward shrugged at her, but he still wondered what she was about to say. Did she know who the teacher was? Was it someone he had already met here?

"So, this is my first class?" asked an old voice.

Edward ignored Winry's fidgeting and stood on tiptoe, trying to see over the other kids. Whoever had spoken was shorter than them and he couldn't see them. He tilted his head to the side but still didn't see the speaker around Dolcetto.

"Well, come in then."

They went through a doorway into a room with a few cement tables and wooden chairs, and a bunch of crates piled in the back. He still couldn't see the teacher.

That is, until they hopped up onto a crate at the desk in the front and tapped their pipe against a piece of metal to draw their attention.

Edward's eyes widened. He had never seen such a short person in all his life. If she was up to his waist, she was pretty tall. She had on a dull green dress and a white apron, a pair of circular glasses perched on her pinched face. Her hair was a grey-ish lavender and pulled back into a pointy bun.

"Sit down wherever. I'll be putting you in pairs later."

They all sat down in a seat near to someone they already knew. Edward plopped down at the first desk, crossing his legs and arms, brows furrowed. Winry sat down next to him, grinning. He watched the old woman give a nod to Dolcetto, who took one look at all of the kids and then left. Edward had a sneaking suspicion that he was waiting outside the door.

When there was relative quiet in the room, she cleared her throat.

"I am Pinako Rockbell. I am not a part of the military, I am just a humble automail engineer from Resembool. My forte is, then, automail, but you will be learning more than one type of engineering in this class. Mechanics for automobiles, electricity, locomotives, and anything else that needs wires to work. My assistant is out today, but you will be meeting him tomorrow." She paused, looking at Edward, who had immediately turned to face Winry at the mention of the teacher's name.

"Is there a problem, pipsqueak?"

Edward grit his teeth together, turning to face forward once again, glaring at the chalkboard behind Pinako. "No."

Pinako turned back to the class. "How many of you here have any experience with engineering?"

Winry's hand flew up into the air, and two boys did as well. The rest sat idly.

"That's fine. We will all be starting with the basics anyhow. Those of you with prior experience can help the others out. Now, I want you to find a partner. Unless there are behavioral problems in the ensuing classes, this will be your partner for the remainder of the month. Choose well." She sat down on the crate she had been standing on and took a puff from her pipe.

"Hey, Ed."

"What?"

Winry held out her hand and cocked her head to one side, smiling.

He was annoyed with her, but she *had* tried to tell him about the teacher, before she was interrupted. Besides, his irritation now was with Pinako and not her relative.

Edward held out his hand and she shook it, a faint metal sound clanking under the shirt. The teacher, unnoticed, narrowed her eyes slightly.

"Now, today, I want you to make me something. Anything. You can use any parts in the boxes in this room. This will be a test to see what you know, and what you don't know. Some of you with the skill will have no problem, and those of you without-you may surprise yourself with a latent ability for mechanics. You may work alone or make a joint work with your partner. I will be watching for any cheaters. Now, off you go."

Winry immediately zipped off to the boxes close to the teacher, and he saw out of the corner of his eye that they were holding a whispered conversation. He went to the closest box and took out two handfuls of random parts and splayed them across his desk. He sat there and stared at them, arms crossed. There were a few wires, a bunch of nuts and bolts and screws, and a few oddly-shaped pieces of metal. What the heck could he make? He had no idea where to start.

Winry sat down next to him and held out a fist. He looked at her questioningly before he held out his own gloved one. She dropped a small object there and then turned back to her own pile of scrap.

He held it between his thumb and forefinger. It was rectangular in shape with two nodules on one side. "What is this?"

"Battery. Can't run anything without life." She held up a piece of metal to the light, squinting, before she started to hammer out a dent.

During the next three hours, he tried his best. He didn't know what the hell he was doing, but he did his best. In the end, he somehow had put together a lop-sided sphere with the battery inside. It made dangerous crackling noises every so often, the sparks lighting up the innards and glowing from the holes in the metal. It was actually quite pretty, if you over-looked the absolutely horrid, rusty outside. It looked like a giant tuber with a creature living inside of it, striking flint.

Edward hadn't noticed Winry leaning over his shoulder until she spoke. "What's that?"

He almost dropped the thing in surprise. He was glad he caught it just in time-he had no idea what it would do; it could have exploded for all he knew.

"Dunno," he said intelligently, shrugging his shoulder.

"Well, you gotta name it, right?"

"It's..." He paused, thinking. "A sparking potato. A sparktater. Yeah, that's it."

Winry giggled and he looked up at her. Sky-blue eyes met his and she smiled again.

He cleared his throat, scooting away from her. "And, uh, what did you make?"

She held up her creation as if it was the staff of God.

"This is Robo-Puppy Den, Mach 3!"

She set it down on the desk and wound up the key on its back. A superbly-created, shiny, awesome toy dog about the height of his forearm came to life then and there and walked across the desk. He watched it in amazement.

"You could do that in three hours...?"

She nodded. "If I had the extra time, I could have made it sit and stand, too. I have two others back home."

At the mention of home, her smile faltered slightly.

"Who are you to the teacher?" he asked quietly.

"She's my granddaughter," came a voice near his elbow. He looked down to see the old woman standing there, staring up at him. "She lives with me, and thus had to come here when I got drafted."

"Drafted?"

"Obligational service to the country. I chose teaching." She let out a stream of smoke and tapped the edge of the desk with her pipe. "Let me see what you have done, Edward Elric."

He handed her the sparktater and she stuck the pipe into her mouth, holding it with her teeth. She moved the weird object around with both hands, seeing it with her fingers just as much as with her eyes. "Interesting..." she said vaguely. The thing emitted a bunch of sparks inside, lighting it up like a strange pumpkin. "Very curious..." She handed it back to him and went over to Winry. "Another Den, Winry? You may as well be making him a litter of puppies."

"Since I can't play with him, I figured he might like some company."

Edward raised an eyebrow. Was this Den a real dog, the model of her toy?

"Nicely done, as usual, Winry." She left them and went back up to the desk. Apparently they were the last to be inspected, being at the front. She called for attention like she had at the start of the class by tapping her pipe against a piece of metal.

"Listen up. Each of you will be starting a project tomorrow, which is due by the end of the month. You can make whatever you want, however you want. You can use what you made today as the starting point, or do something completely different. That is all."

Edward pinched the bridge of his nose. A project? Was she even going to teach them anything?

"Hey, Ed?"

"What?"

She fidgeted slightly in her seat and he raised an eyebrow.

"Could I... um..." She bit her lip. "Tomorrow, could I... see your automail?"

He narrowed his eyes dangerously. "In front of all these people...? You-"

"They're going to find out anyway!" she whispered furiously. "Why not now, so that they can start getting used to it?"

He sat back in his chair, scowling. He didn't want to admit that she had a point.

"Please, Ed? For my project, I want to... make you a new arm and leg."

Gold met blue once more, one gaze widened with surprise, the other narrowed with determination.

"Why?"

"Because my dream is to be an automail mechanic. I helped out at the shop with granny, but this will be my first time making something on my own. Please, Ed. If you don't like them, you don't have to wear them, I just..."

He held up a hand to stop her. She blinked in confusion.

"Alright," he said reluctantly, crossing his arms and looking away. "As long as you don't interfere with my own project."

"Thank you!" she whispered, taking his right and squeezing it with both of her own. The sound of metal and against metal as his fingers were crushed together was still so abnormal to him.

When she let go, he held up his hand, still gloved, and stared at it. Then he made a fist and furrowed his brows.

He hoped her automail was a helluva lot better than the ones he had on. 


	7. Guns and Crosses

Paninya stuck close to Alphonse, sat next to him when they entered the classroom. The teacher wasn't there yet, so Martel stayed with them, glaring at any of them who decided they wanted to chat.

Five minutes passed before the classroom door suddenly slammed open. Paninya jumped in her seat and Alphonse's eyes widened. In surprised, at first, and then utter shock.

Standing in the doorway was a tall woman with an ample bosom, wearing what could have been a scientist's outfit, a red tattoo on her right breast. Her hair was long and braided and pulled back into a messy pile at the back of her head, some braids falling out and framing her face. Her eyes were black and sharp. Her shoes were plain water closet sandals.

A metal choker was around her neck.

"Sen-" Alphonse started, but the woman shifted her gaze to him, and he stopped. Her face was exceptionally angry. He knew that when she looked like that, that no words should be said to her.

Martel glanced at the woman and then left without a word, closing the door behind her.

The braided woman went to the front of the class and faced them, folded her arms. Silence had fallen since she had entered and was not interrupted in the meantime.

After while, her gaze softened slightly. "My name is Izumi Curtis. I will be your Alchemy instructor. You will call me sensei and nothing else, understood?"

"Yes, sensei!"

She slammed her fist onto the top of a desk. "Excuse me?" she asked them, serious.

No one said a word, confused.

"If the majority of you say yes, how can I hear when someone says no? Hm?"

Silence.

"Exactly. When I ask if you understand me, and you do, you will not say a thing. Those who do not understand will say 'no, sensei'. Understood?"

Silence again.

"Good. Now sit down."

Those who had jumped up when the door had slammed open slowly slid back down into their chairs.

"I've been drafted to teach you Alchemy, unfortunately. Now, first person in each row, get the amount of books you need from the right. Pronto."

Those on the right scurried off and brought back books to be passed down the line.

"These books are to remain in the classroom, understood? Alchemy is a dangerous thing. I will not allow any of you to use it when not in my presence."

She paused as if something had just crossed her mind.

"How many of you have experience?"

A few kids raised their hands, but none higher than Alphonse.

"Hah. Well, everyone can use it, but only a few are really skilled enough to rely on it completely. Alchemy is like every other skill-you can learn it, but true mastery can only come from honing it to perfection, from having the right mental and physical shape to mold it to your will."

Izumi went over and picked up a book herself, flipped it open. "You, girl, in the first row. Read."

Paninya stood up abruptly. "Yes, sensei!" Alphonse could see her trembling. Was she that afraid of failing? He glanced at Izumi and then it clicked. He was used to this woman's attitude, but she probably scared everyone else who first met her.

The black girl started out shaky at first but her voice leveled out considerably as she read. Terms she had no idea about fell off of her tongue and dropped undiscerned on the floor. She even pronounced things wrong. Even so, Izumi kept her reading, following along in her own book, correcting her mispronunciations.

She switched to Alphonse at the end of the page and he started to read with gusto. Unlike Paninya, he actually understood what he was reading.

Izumi finally looked up at the end and saw some of her students staring off into space. Suddenly, she slammed her book down on a desk and everyone jumped again.

"Enough," she said. "This is boring. We're going outside."

7777777

"A little higher, Chang."

Mei fixed the position of her gun by a scent millimeter, then shot it once more.

"Very good. Have you ever used a rifle before?"

"No, ma'am, I haven't."

"You have a good eye for things like this."

"I throw knives."

Riza Hawkeye let her eyeglass fall back to her chest and wrote a note on her clipboard. She was a beautiful woman, with hair to her mid-back that was the shade of gold between the Elric brothers' and Winry's. Her eyes were a brown that had a hint of red, like a nice cup of strong tea. She had shed her military jacket to reveal a tight-fitting black shirt that accentuated her strong arms.

Their Marksmanship instructor was extremely calm. Something about her just demanded obedience. Her elegance, perhaps, or her overwhelming aura of complete certainty.

"Keep working on your aim with that rifle, Chang. You have more skill than just knife-throwing."

From what Mei had seen so far, Hawkeye never said anything mean or condescending. She patiently corrected her students and urged them to do their best.

Hawkeye went over to the wall and pulled the cord attached to a bell. It rang loudly and everyone stopped their shooting, took off the enhanced mufflers that protected their ears from the noise. Practicing what Riza had taught them, they opened the chamber and stick in a cord to keep it open and unable to shoot. They then placed the barrels to point downrange.

"You may go down the range and get your targets, then bring them here."

Mei scurried across the hard ground to her target. Most of the bullets had come close to the bull's eye. One of them, the last one she had shot, was smack dab in the middle of it. She made a self-satisfied smile and went back to the instructor.

"Your names are already on them, so bring them here. I will keep all of your targets. At the end of the week, I will show you how much progress you have made. Havoc." This last word, a name, she said to a tall man at the other end of the walkway. He was blonde as well, with blue eyes, an aloof expression, and a permanent cigarette in his mouth.

He came over and took the targets from her, sighing. "Let me guess, I'm doing the paperwork for you?"

"Fix that attitude, Havoc," she said, sparing a quick glance to the side. "It won't help you at all."

What she had looked at-who-was the green-haired boy that had tormented Edward earlier. He was grinning again, his purple eyes flashing.

Mei didn't like him one bit.

7777777

"I wouldn't advise this, Curtis."

"It's my neck on the line, not yours. Your order was to make sure they are kept in line, and they are in line."

Martel said nothing for awhile, following the errant Alchemy teacher. "Very well," she finally said. She fingered her own neck. "I don't envy you one bit, Curtis."

The older woman smirked before slamming open the door to the outside world.

Alphonse squinted into the daylight. It wasn't the circular courtyard where that had had physical training. It was another place, around the back of the school, perhaps. The empty ground went on for a few hundred yards until it hit a giant cement wall that enclosed the whole institution.

There was also another class outside. Definitely not Engineering.

"Ignore them, they're the Marksmanship class." Izumi snapped her fingers to get their attention back. "You will get to be in that class soon enough. For now, your attention should be on me and only me."

The sound of gunshots beginning again startled them.

"You must also learn to ignore distractions that do not concern you. With practice, you will be able to tune everything out. Alchemy in itself requires immense concentration. Do something half-assed and you might end up with no body, stuck in a place worse than death. Understood?"

Silence.

Izumi sucked in a breath and loudly clapped her hands together. She then crouched and touched the ground. A beautiful glow glow issued from the dirt in the form of a circle. This blue glow continued as a long staff materialized in the center. She grabbed a hold of it with one hand as if bled upwards. The blue glow faded, revealing an upside-down cross which she tilted upwards. This cross held a snake wrapped around the tines.

It was the same shape as the tattoo on her chest, minus a floating crown and two small wings.

"No matter how hard you try," she said, and they all looked up at her instead of the cross, "you will never be able to do what I did just now."

Someone raised a hand. The small boy, the six-year-old, with the bored expression.

"Yes?" she asked him.

"Why do you say it's impossible for us?"

"Sensei," she said.

Silence.

The boy closed his eyes. "Sensei," he repeated.

"Perhaps, one day, when you have seen Hell and come back, you will be able to do it. For now, you will learn about transmutation circles. No act of Alchemy is done without a transmutation circle. Even when I clapped my hands, with no drawn circles in sight, the circle appeared on the ground."

Using the end of the cross she drew a perfect circle.

"This is a gateway, where power flows freely and shapes whatever you want."

Izumi stabbed the cross into the middle of the circle.

"I take back that sentence. It cannot make whatever you want. For a staff, you must use wood, or, in this case, earth. You cannot turn this dirt into water, or fire, or air. Notice that a huge chunk of earth is missing. That went into this staff. It is a concept called equivalent exchange. You cannot gain something without sacrificing nothing-"

She suddenly hunched over, holding onto the cross, coughing. Something wet hit the ground. Alphonse stepped forward, alarmed. It was blood. The dry earth soaked it in thirstily.

"Stay back," she warned, panting. She sucked in a breath and stood up, wiped the rest of the blood from her chin.

"Sensei, are you okay?" Paninya asked, concerned. She had been afraid of this woman, but the way she had kindly corrected her pronounciation in class earlier had made her warm up to Izumi.

"I'm fine."

"Is that so?" asked a voice.

They all turned to look. The principal was walking towards them, unconcerned.

"King Bradley..." Izumi said quietly, but Alphonse had heard her. She spat another mouthful of blood on the ground.

"I do not think you are doing well, Izumi Curtis. Perhaps a visit to the infirmary?"

He waved his wrist and another man dressed in the blue uniform stepped forward. He was pale with black hair that slipped slightly over his dark eyes.

"Mustang will cover for you."

The young man stepped forward and bowed his head to Izumi who glared at him. "I don't need no military poodle to help me, Bradley. I can teach my class myself. That's what you brought me here for, isn't it?"

Martel cast a warning glance at the older woman, but Izumi wasn't watching. She was staring at the principal with a calm face. Alphonse knew she was radiating hatred with all of her being. What had this man done to her to make her so angry?

Bradley fingered his neck. As if in response, Izumi's arm moved upwards slightly. She seemed to get the hint and narrowed her eyes a fraction.

"Very well... Principal... he can stay while I rest for a few minutes."

"Oh, no, I insist you go to the infirmary, Izumi Curtis."

In the end, she was escorted away by the principal, who nodded at the Marksmanship instructor in passing as if he just picked up middle-aged women everyday and took them to the hospital for coughing up a massive amount of blood.

The sound of a throat clearing. They turned to their new instructor.

"I'm Roy Mustang. You will call me Instructor. I am a State Alchemist." He pulled out a glove and slipped it onto his hand. He held it up for all to see, his hand poised as if he was going to snap his fingers. The glove had a red transmutation circle on the back of his hand. "If you carry a circle with you, everything is made easier. You do not have to spend the few precious seconds you need in a fight by drawing shapes on the ground. For me, all of my materials are in this glove." After that, he really did snap his fingers.

A red line, like lightning, flew...

...and the cross erupted into flames.


	8. Circle

The cross seemed to burn forever under their collective gazes.

And then, all of a sudden, it stopped. Other than being covered in a layer of black, the cross remained intact. The snake's eyes, which they hadn't noticed before, glowed a brilliant ruby-red under the sun.

Mustang gave a half-hearted smile.

"There are limitations to even alchemy. For instance, my flames, they can only burn what can be burned. Rock, as this staff is made of, is flame-proof. I could only cause flames on the initial dust on the staff that had settled from the air, and after that it was consuming oxygen."

He held up his gloved hand. "This is my weapon. This glove causes friction when I snap my fingers, much like striking flint. It ignites and travels through the air almost instantaneously." He then placed his hand back into his pocket. "My specialty is flames. Those of you who will become skilled in alchemy may or may not choose your own style. My style reflects my career. A human weapon." A pause. "Not all alchemy is for fighting, though. Some can rebuild what has been broken, heal what has been hurt, create art from the soil. Like this cross here."

He cleared his throat and took hold of the staff, used it to draw a five-pointed star in the middle of the circle Izumi had drawn earlier.

"This is a basic transmutation circle. It takes practice to draw a perfect circle. You will start now."

Mustang replaced the staff into the hole it had occupied and touched the circle on the ground with his hands. A blue glow and the staff transformed into a dozen or so metal rods about the length of his forearm. He handed these to each of them and they squatted on the ground to draw.

The six-year-old boy held up his hand again.

"Yes?"

"Why didn't you use the transmutation circle on your glove to turn the cross into sticks?"

"The circle I have on my glove is used for my fire transmutations. It isn't used for anything else."

The boy nodded and sat down in the dirt, started to draw a circle.

Alphonse had finished quite quickly. He sat back and looked at it critically. Paninya looked over, her own circle not very circular. "What's all that other stuff, Al?"

"It's my own transmutation circle. Once you study a bit, you'll be able to make up your own, too."

Mustang seemed rather bored with them after awhile. He kept snapping his fingers and making flames erupt in the air in small pockets. They dispersed seconds after and then he would create another one. Even his eyes looked bored.

'Was he used to military life?' Alphonse thought. Teaching was clearly not his forte. Staying still and waiting was probably not his strong point either. He wondered if Izumi was okay, and as an afterthought, that she was a much better teacher than this Mustang person.

What had once been silence, other than the scribbling sounds in the dirt, was broken by a gunshot. Alphonse heard it fly by, a slight whistle in the wind. Mustang had stopped in his tracks, his hand poised to snap his fingers once more.

He glanced down at his glove and pursed his lips before putting his hand back into his jacket pocket. Alphonse had noticed that there was a giant rip across the back, breaking the circle. Mustang turned and gave a glance towards the Marksmanship class, and Al followed his gaze. A beautiful blonde-haired woman soldier had turned back to her class, but there was a rifle across her back.

Had she shot at Mustang? It seemed possible. But why? She hadn't had the intention to hurt, apparently. The look on Mustang's face was not one of shock but one with a hint of amusement. Perhaps they were quarreling. From the blatant way she was ignoring him now, it seemed that way.

"What's this?" Mustang asked, looking down at Alphonse's circle, bringing the boy back to the present. "You've added quite a bit. Can you use it?"

As if in answer, Al placed his hand on the rim of the circle and let the energy of the earth flow through the small gateway. In a few seconds there was a miniature version of the cross, standing up in a dipped-down bowl where he had used the soil to make it.

Mustang locked eyes with him, studying. "You're one of the Elric brothers?"

Alphonse blinked. "Yes." And, as an afterthought, added, "Sir."

"Hmm."

He said nothing else as he went and inspected the others' circles, correcting them.

88888888

They all trudged into the cafeteria, exhausted, for lunch. They were all sweaty, as there was no fresh breeze in the building and the outside was incredibly hot.

Alphonse immediately glommed onto his brother and waited on pins and needles until they all had their food.

"'nii-san, guess what?"

Edward stared critically at the square food. A salad block, sandwich block, potato block, and the ever present orange juice block. "What?"

"The Alchemy teacher-it's our sensei!"

Edward had just set a huge chunk of sandwich to his mouth on a fork but he immediately dropped it back onto his tray.

"What?" he asked, blinking.

"Sensei, from Dublith, she's the teacher for Alchemy!"

Instead of being happy, Edward frowned. "What is she doing here? She hates the military, especially the state alchemists."

"I don't know, but she had one of her coughing fits and she got replaced by another military guy named Mustang."

"Hmm..."

"I hope she's alright," Alphonse said, poking at his salad block, which was unfurling in a rather gross way. "The principal was out there and he sounded kind of threatening. Oh!"

The exclamation made Edward jump.

"The principal's name is King Bradley."

Edward frowned again. Bradley. Where had he heard that name before? It rang a bell in his mind, but... living in an urban town that specialized in sheep was a bit of a hindrance when it came to news about what happened in the big city.

"How was your class, 'nii-san?"

Edward bit down onto his fork, scowling. He was staring at Winry, who was a little ways down the table with Paninya and Mei.

"...That bad?"

"Well, apparently my engineering skills are 'interesting' and 'curious', according to Winry's grandmother."

"Grandmother?"

"She was drafted to teach Engineering and brought Winry with her."

"Oh," said Alphonse, and his eyes widened. "Sensei said that she was drafted as well."

"Hmm..."

All this drafting... and to bring people here who did not want to be here, no less. Edward chewed pensively on his fork, deep in thought. What point was there to have teachers that did not want to teach, and recruits that did not want to learn?

88888888

Riza Hawkeye looked up as the door to the break room clicked open. A dark-haired man she knew all too well stepped in and closed the door behind him. He didn't acknowledge her presence, only went to a trash can and pointedly dropped his ruined glove in it before stepping away and going to a coffee pot. He poured himself a mug and downed it before he even said anything.

"That was a nice trick you did out there, Lieutenant."

"I'm not a lieutenant anymore," she said, calmly sipping her tea. She set down her newspaper and steepled her fingers in front of her, elbows on the table. She looked at him piercingly across her fingertips. "So?"

Roy took a swift glance around the room without moving his head before shrugging. "He's wasting no time breaking me into teaching."

Their gazes locked for a few seconds before she sat back, taking her teacup in her fingers once again. "You demonstrated your... talent... quite a bit today."

"That's what he wants me to do."

"Your weaknesses are going to come to light, Colonel."

"I'm not a colonel anymore either."

She took a sip of tea again and picked up her newspaper.

"Anything interesting in there?"

"Nope."

She closed it and slid it across to Roy, who picked it up as he sat down and leafed through it. A train wreck in the east. An interview of a soldier from the north... "Briggs is a bit lost without their queen, isn't it?"

"Completely under military rule again. Her specially-trained soldiers are being squashed into a hole to prevent an uprising."

They locked eyes again.

"Very well." He stood up and went to the door. Then he paused and looked back at the paper. "Mind if I take that?"

"Be my guest."

He folded it up into a square and stuffed it into a pocket under his military jacket. "Enjoy your tea, Lieutenant."

"And you your paper, Colonel."

He opened the door and she heard an audible snap as his fingers rubbed together. The glove in the trashcan ignited into flames as he shut the door.

Riza calmly sipped her tea, watching the fire dance within and eventually burn down to ash.


	9. History

After lunch, all thirty-two kids were led to a large room. There were desks much like the ones in Pinako's classroom, ones that sat two people. They were all told to sit down, and they did. Alphonse and Edward sat at one desk somewhere around the middle, Winry and Mei at the desk to the right of them. Paninya and another girl, one with dark skin and dark brown hair with pink (pink? seriously? Edward thought) bangs, sat in front of Winry and Mei.

The boy named Ling, the one from Xing with long hair tied back into a wild ponytail, sat at the desk to the left at Alphonse. A girl with the same Xing features sat next to him, her dark hair short and pulled back into a bun at the crown of her head. Bangs covered her eyes, longer near the sides. They seemed to know each other, as she was whispering something to him that Al could not hear, and he was nodding.

Someone cleared their throat, and they all looked up to see a man walk in. Al's eyes widened. He was teaching this class, too?

Mustang stood in front of them, his hands clasped behind his back.

"Good afternoon," he said. He looked at them all. The ones in Alchemy had recognized him, but the others had no idea. "I am Roy Mustang, a former State Alchemist. I will be sharing this class with another teacher."

He looked to the door and it opened once more to admit an old man. He was rather short with grey, scraggly, stick-up hair (other than the rather noticable bald spot on the top of his head), and Edward found himself seeing another epic mustache that was bushy and meticulously-groomed, sticking up at the corners like a weird smile.

He had a high-pitched creaky voice as he introduced himself. "My name is Grumman. I am your primary Military History teacher. I have asked Roy Mustang to be my assistant in this classroom." He smiled, his eyes crinkling on the sides.

"And now... to war!"

'To war' meant sending 'troops' into 'battle' to find 'resources' and then return to their 'bases'. Meaning, the kids were made to get up and get textbooks and go back to their desks.

Lessons included full reenactments by mostly Grumman and Mustang, with a few of the kids joining in as soldiers or civilians or the like. Most of the time, Grumman was the Fuhrer and Mustang had to act out all of the other officers.

It was like a sadistic game of make-believe. 'Sadistic' meaning... Mustang obviously did not want to do this job. Edward found himself snickering at his wooden and reluctant performances.

Grumman was an exceptional actor. When Mustang proved to still be reluctant after the thirtieth reenactment, the old man took it upon himself to do a number of roles all at once. He kept hopping around the room, changing personas. It was funny at first, but the seriousness in which he acted drew them all in. Edward half-imagined different hairstyles and personalities, super-imposing the faces in the book on top of Grumman. It was almost like watching a movie, except with vocals and not a boring classical soundtrack with words printed on the screen.

Edward noticed that there was a lot of bloodshed in Amestris' history, and the peculiar way that the country was almost perfectly rounded. It didn't occur to him that this might be important later, but he soaked the information in like a sponge.

Overall, what he felt might have been a boring class actually proved interesting. Now here was the perfect teacher. Grumman kept every single one of the kids' attentions on him through the entire class, and the perfectness of his reenactments left no room for questions-he was completely understood.

The three hours of Military History passed by incredibly fast. It was already 1600. They filed down the hallways, brains full to bursting, back to the chow hall. Edward felt like he had gone through several lifetimes of campaigns in the past three hours, and they had barely nicked the iceberg that was Amestris' history.

There was no food set out at the end of the room. Not susprising-it was only four o'clock. The tables had been removed and placed against the sides of the room, folded up to conserve space. They were told to stand in ranks and they formed two platoons once again.

A beautiful woman was on the stage, sitting with one leg crossed over the other. She was wearing a black dress that showed off her well-endowed bosom, which Edward found curious. Why was she wearing a dress that looked like she belonged at a dance hall? Her hair was long and wavy and black with extremely subtle red highlights. Her eyes were dark as well.

She looked up at them when they were finally settled and stood up, holding a clipboard in front of her. Her hands and most of her arms were covered in long black gloves.

"On behalf of the principal, I come bearing orders for the... children." The way she said 'children' made a shiver go down his spine. "The duties are assigned henceforth-"

She went down the list, saying each of their names. He wasn't really paying attention to who she was talking to, but what she was assigning them. Still, he caught a few names he had not heard before, like the girls'. Lan Fan-she sounded Xingese, maybe it was the girl that had sat next to Ling? Rose, Laila, Nina, Elicia.

The three boys that hadn't supplied their names when they had all introduced themselves... they were not mentioned.

Their assigned duties were typical chores. Laundry, cleaning the rooms and halls, sweeping the courtyard and the front steps, sorting the library... wait, they had a library? First he heard of it.

Ling, Edward, and Russell had the duty of cleaning the courtyard. Alphonse, Mei, a girl named Rose, and the Ishaballan Rick (the younger of the two brothers) had the honor of doing laundry (which answered Edward's question of where their exercise clothes went-they were washed every afternoon). Winry was off to the library with Lan Fan and Fletcher. Paninya was stuck with two boys she didn't know-Rio and Khayal-to clean the kitchens. The rest of them were given other such menial tasks of cleaning or sorting.

"When you are finished with your assigned tasks, you will either return here or go to your barracks. No boys are allowed in the female barracks, and no girls are allowed in the male barracks. There will be no meeting up in any other place except for the chow hall. Any noncompliances will be dealt with severely, especially if you do not do your assigned duties correctly. You are to return to the chow hall at 1900. You are dismissed."

The kids that had to clean places they hadn't seen yet were led off by soldiers. The rest were given free reign-meaning they had to get to their posts stat or risk getting a detention with Armstrong.

The three boys went down the hall to where their barracks were and went down the hallway in their room to the courtyard outside. A wooden door on the side opened to reveal a few rakes and brooms. Seeing as it was summer, the tree hadn't shed any leaves, but there were a few branches here and there that they picked up. The sun was hot on their backs as they worked. A soldier came from time to time to check up on them, but they didn't even want to risk fooling around. They chatted every so often, but mostly concentrated on their work. The faster it was done, the faster they could get back to people they knew.

"So, how was classes for you two?" asked Ling as he took an armful of thin branches and deposited them into a bin inside the closet.

"I don't know much about Engineering," Edward said, "But I at least made some type of... something."

Russell, the older of the blonde-haired, blue-eyed brothers, laughed at his vague words. "Something, huh? Must have been epic."

"Oh, yes. A sparking potato. It's mankind's greatest achievement," Edward said sarcastically. "I can't wait until I get shifted to Alchemy."

Ling had picked up a broom and was brushing small twigs against the base of the tree. "Me, personally, I know nothing about alchemy. Never had a talent for it. Besides, the teachers were weird and I really didn't learn anything today."

"Oh?" Russell asked. "I had Marksmanship, and I didn't do too bad. I know a bit of alchemy, but not much about mechanics either." He paused. "Our teacher was good. She never said a bad word to us and just corrected us when we were wrong. My aim got a little better today."

"Our teacher just let us have free reign to make stuff. What if we happened to blow up the classroom?" Edward muttered. "I certainly seemed to come close."

The three boys chatted on and off and laughed during the next two hours while they finished sweeping. With an hour left, they went to the barracks. Ling disappeared, probably off to the chow hall to see Lan Fan. Edward had found out that that was the girl's name Ling had sat next to, and that they did know each other, but nothing more than that. Ling had a mysterious way of being mysterious without really catching one's attention about it.

Fletcher was already there by the time they arrived. Apparently there wasn't much to do in the library. The two brothers went off to the chow hall as well, leaving Edward alone in the room. Winry was probably chilling with her other girlfriends or in the chow hall, and he didn't really want to see her right now. He laid down on his bunk and stared at the one above him, where his brother slept. He took off the glove on his right hand and stretched his automail arm up to touch the bottom of the mattress.

Edward's heart throbbed in his chest and he clenched his eyes shut, covering them with the metal arm. It felt cool against his eyelids and forehead. It felt... dead.

He and Alphonse were lucky to be alive. 


	10. Agony

"'nii-san!"

Edward sat up abruptly in bed and bonked his head on the frame for the second time that day. While he was gipping his forehead painfully, he sucked in deep breaths and shuddered.

"'nii-san? Are you okay? You looked like you were having a nightmare."

Ed felt drying tears on his face and hastily wiped them away. "I'm fine." Another shiver went through him as the lingering effects of the dream disappeared.

"Were you dreaming about...?"

"I said I'm fine," Ed said harshly and Al took a step back.

The older brother looked at him with wide eyes. "Shit. Sorry, Al, I'm just..."

"It's okay," Al said, shuffling his feet. "It's almost seven o'clock. I came to get you for dinner."

After slipping his glove back on, Edward followed his little brother out of the room and down the hall.

"How was courtyard duty?" Al asked.

"It was okay. Pretty easy, just took a long time. How was laundry?"

"It took the whole three hours," Alphonse sighed and put one hand on his neck, rotated the shoulder in its socket. "We didn't just have to wash our clothes, we had to do all of the soldiers' as well." He grunted as his shoulder popped. "Poor Mei, she had to do all of the girls' clothes herself, and she's so tiny."

"That midget Xingese girl?"

"That's pretty harsh, 'nii-san. You're not much taller than her."

Edward slapped his brother on the back of the head and scowled, walking faster.

"Hey!" Al whined. "I was just stating the truth."

"You're being disrespectful to your brother, that's what you were doing."

Al rolled his eyes as they entered the chow hall. That moved down the row and sat next to Ling. Lan Fan sat across from him and they weren't talking, simply staring at the table. Winry was next to her and directly across from Edward. He scowled at the arrangement, but she was too busy drawing on a piece of paper to even notice them arriving at the table.

It was a diagram, extremely complex. A book was open at her elbow and she studied it with furrowed brow before sketching a few more things on the paper.

"What's that, Winry?" Al asked conversationally.

She jumped at the mention of her name and looked around, and her eyes fixed on Alphonse. "Oh. It's... my Engineering project." Her eyes flicked to Edward's before back to her paper. She erased the line she had just drawn (when she had been interrupted, it had lurched off into an odd zigzag) and redrew it.

So that picture was his new arm or leg, huh? Well, now that he looked at it, it kind of resembled fingers, only they were in various pieces to show the insides, which were mostly wires and some pieces of... stuff. Edward was oddly curious about it and leaned over. The numbers and letters and lines meant nothing to him, but it was incredibly well-drawn and detailed. She was obviously a professional.

Dinner was much like the other meals, although the talking was a scant more subdued from people being tired. Edward was right in thinking that they had the same thing everyday, because there was the weird meat square on his tray and the blocks of potatoes and vegetables, and the ever-present orange juice.

Winry was so into her diagram that the girl next to her (the one with dark skin and pink bangs) had to nudge her and bring her back to earth. She scarfed down dinner and gulped down her juice and immediately went back to her paper. No one bothered her after that.

Edward was watching her draw with a glazed look in his eyes. He saw her putting lines and notes here and there, but they didn't register in his mind. His thoughts were back on the dream he had earlier. He was so distracted by his brain that even when Mei giggled loudly at something Alphonse said, he didn't even hear her.

He could remember an explosion. Fire. Screaming. He remembered the exact order it sank in when he had regained consciousness. The metal frame above him, pinning his arm and leg to the ground. The fire raging around him. The screaming, and how he wondered whose it was, and then he realized that it was his own voice crying out in pain. And then the pain registered, a bitchslap to the senses, and then he *knew* he was screaming, felt the voice being torn from his raw throat, and then... darkness.

Edward hadn't noticed he had hunched over, his automail hand gripping the stump that was left of his left leg and his left hand gripping the flesh at his right shoulder, until his brother called his name.

He looked up, his eyes swimming, sweat rolling down his forehead and back.

"'nii-san..." Alphonse whispered in alarm. "Does it hurt?"

Ed sucked in a breath, realizing the places where his automail started were paining him greatly.

"I'll... I'll be fine," he lied, his grip tightening on the flesh as if it could squeeze the agony out.

The immediate people around them were all looking at him. Even Winry had glanced up to see what was wrong, and stared with her eyes wide.

He could *feel* his shattered human limbs, superimposing over the automail. He could feel them crushed and bloodied and dying and the tear of the muscle and skin as they had felt when they were slowly being torn off.

Alphonse pulled out an envelope from his pocket and shook out two white objects. Pills. Edward's medicine, which he kept with him because his brother was so damn stubborn. He handed them to his brother who gulped them down and sucked down the last of his orange juice.

Edward laid his head on the table, his body involuntarily shaking. By the end of the dinner period, about fifteen minutes hence, the pain had ebbed halfway. He shrugged off his brother and headed down the hall to the dorm and fell into the bed, curling up into a ball.

"'nii-san. You need to change your clothes."

He ignored the suggestion for about five minutes before he begrudgingly sat up. Alphonse covered him from view with a blanket and Edward changed into the plaid pajamas that had been left on the bed by someone.

The pain almost gone, he laid back down and breathed in heavily.

A shadow came over his closed eyes and he opened them to see a dark shape blocking the light on the ceiling. His eyes adjusted and he noticed the green-haired boy with no name grinning down at him. His eyes were alit with something inconceivable that made a subconscious shiver go down his spine.

"Chibi in pain?" he said, in a mock-worried voice.

Edward said nothing.

Suddenly the grin was replaced by a snarl. "You have no idea what real pain is, midget."

The golden-haired boy watched him as he turned and stalked away, back to the bunk with the other two that had the same eyes.

Maybe it was because of the painkillers, but he couldn't even get himself to get worked up about what the other boy had just said to him. And in a few minutes he was fast asleep. 


	11. Drastic Measures

He had no dreams that night, and the double medication made him indredibly groggy in the morning. So groggy that Alphonse had to pull him out of bed and half-dress him himself, which was hard to do when he was holding up a blanket. Ed leaned against his brother, rubbing his eyes, as they walked down the hallway to do their physical training.

His attempts at working out were half-hearted, but the fresh air slowly woke him up. Instead of trying to jog like he had yesterday, he just walked. Alphonse offered to walk with him, but Ed shrugged him away.

"I'm waking up. Go chill with Fletcher."

Nonetheless, the little brother kept an eye on him as much as he could. When Winry popped up beside his older brother, along with the small Mei, he felt like he could relax a little more.

With the chirping of two annoying birds (wait, they were girls) in his ear, he woke up even more.

"Could you stop shrieking in my ear, please?" he asked.

"Oh, so you *are* awake," Winry said, before going back to her conversation with Mei.

They were talking about boys. Someone with gold hair. Mei was practically squeeing over him. He thought absently about who it could be. Russell? Fletcher? Him?

And then, it dawned on him. Alphonse?

"Are you talking about my brother?"

Mei looked at him, frowning. "So what if I am?"

Hm. So the midget girl had a crush on his little brother. A smirk grew on his face.

"What's with that look?" Mei growled. Something in her shirt squirmed and her eyes widened and she clapped her hands over it. Winry said nothing about it, just looked away. However, Edward's eyes widened.

"What was that?" he asked.

"Nothing," Mei said quickly, smoothing her shirt back down, which was much too big for her.

"Uh huh. Now unless you have tentacles or a heart on the outside of your body, I do believe something is down your shirt."

"Pervert!" she shrieked, and ran off at a great speed. Edward cocked an eyebrow at her and shrugged.

"Smooth, Ed, smooth." Winry commented.

"I try." He paused. "So what was that?"

"What was what?"

"That thing in her-... Actually, you know what? Nevermind. I don't want to know."

Winry smiled and hummed a tune beside him, her arms behind her back, kicking her legs up a little as she walked. He watched her silently. She looked tired as well, and her hair wasn't pulled back as neatly as it had been yesterday. Had she been working on that sketch all night, or something? But he shook the thought off at once, as it was slightly conceited of him to assume that she had stayed up all night drawing plans for an automail that would ultimately belong to him. He looked away from her, back at his own feet.

She was pretty, but he hated the fact that he had to slant his eyes upwards to look at her full-on. So he didn't.

"I see you're still wearing those winter clothes," she commented suddenly.

"Yeah."

"They're going to know about them today, you know."

"I know."

"One last stand?"

"Yup."

The rest of the morning workout passed uneventfully, as did breakfast, and the much-looked-forward-to shower.

But once he was in the grey uniform and walking down the hall to Engineering, his heart beat faster. He was definitely awake now. More than awake. Scarily awake. He was so awake that he could *feel* the walls staring at him, at his metal limbs.

Maybe it was just paranoia. But still.

They seated themselves at their desks. Pinako nodded at them and went back to whatever she was working on at her own desk. It was a humongous automail arm that contained a chain saw and she was oiling the chain lovingly.

The class took the nod as a signal to start working on their class projects. A few students on the right saw that there were bookshelves and eagerly pulled some of them down, handed them around.

Winry immediately pulled out the drawing that she had done last night, accompanied by a few more that looked suspiciously like plans for an arm and a leg.

"Okay," she said, and sat there looking expectantly at him.

"...What?"

"Undress."

He choked on nothing. "I beg your pardon?"

"Undress," she said again, blinking. "Am I not speaking English?"

"Uh..."

She frowned before a slight flush came over her cheeks. "You *are* a pervert."

"What?" he asked indignantly. "You're the one telling me to take my clothes off!"

Half the class looked over at them. Apparently he had said this a little too loud. She clenched her fist against the desk, her eyes closed, her face a scowl completely ruined by the blood rushing to her face.

"Just take off your shirt and pants so I can measure you're limbs," she said forcefully, teeth clenched.

He swallowed before taking a deep breath. And so he shed his jacket and revealed to the world, finally, his right arm.

Some stared. Some looked away, various emotions on their face. Some looked and shrugged and went back to their work. He felt his own face heat up under the atmosphere in the room.

Winry wasted no time. She pulled out a tape measure from her pocket and stood up. She measured the length of his forearm, his fingers, the stretch of metal between his elbow and the top of his shoulder, then the entire shoulder, and the circumferences of everything. She jotted down notes on a piece of paper. Then she examined his automail with her brows furrowed.

"Cheap," she said, suddenly, making him jump. She hadn't said anything before then and he had somewhat spaced out. By then most of the people had gone back to their projects and he had relaxed slightly.

"Huh?" he asked intelligently.

"This automail is cheap. Hospital-supplied?"

"Yeah."

She shook her head in despair. "I have my work cut out for me. Okay, pants off."

He had boxers on, but still, he felt incredibly exposed in front of his classmates, in more ways then one, when the pants pooled at his ankles and he stepped out of them.

And her close proximity to his body as she measured his leg made him start to fidget. He tapped his human foot against the ground, his fingers against the desk.

"Stop moving," she complained, and he froze, rigid.

Winry stopped writing measurements on the paper and sat there on the floor, gently prodding the automail leg.

"Also cheap. Probably same manufacturer. You only have the basics in there and the silhouette is awful."

"Silhouette?"

"The casing. What makes it actually look like a limb."

"It's called a silhouette?"

"No, but it sounds more romantic than 'casing', don't you think?" she asked, looking up at him and smiling.

His heart skipped a beat.

But only once.

"Romantic. Right."

But she was back to examining it once more. "Awful," she repeated. "Ugly. No art at all. A disappointment to those of us who make these for a living." She was mumbling to herself now as she got up from her sitting position and kneeled over the leg. She tentatively touched the base of the automail, the metal casing that covered the exposed flesh of what was left of his thigh.

He flinched at the action.

"Sorry," she said, removing her hand quickly. "Did that hurt?"

"Kinda."

She tapped her lips with a pencil as she frowned and he had the slight notion that her expression was cute.

"They did a horrible job of this," Winry grumbled.

"So you've said. A few times already."

"Sorry, but it really is distasteful." She stood up, brushing her pants off and sat back down. "You can put your clothes on now."

Edward quickly slipped them on and then scooted his chair back up to the desk. Half the period was gone and he suddenly thought of his own project.

"Oh, no..."

Winry looked up, blinking.

"I have no idea what I'm going to do." He ran his human hand through his damp hair and let his forehead thump down on the wooden desk.

"Improve on your sparktater?"

"Why would I do that? And how did you remember its name?"

"Because it was funny. And it looks interesting. I'm wondering what you can do to improve it."

"It's not going to be a work of art."

"Doesn't matter," she said, shrugging. "If you like it, that's that. You worked hard on it yesterday, and that's all that matters."

He turned his head, cheek resting on the desk, to look at her. She was fully concentrating on her papers now, fixing the sketches she had made yesterday of the fingers, calculating in his lengths and widths.

It was entrancing, how she lost herself in what she loved the most.

Eventually, though, she looked over at him and he picked his head up slightly at her confused face.

"What?" she asked.

To which he replied, "Nothing," and went to the front to get his weird invention from yesterday. It sparked rather loudly when he sat back down and she smiled at him.

"Don't worry," she said. "Your automail is really going to be a work of art, even if your sparktater isn't."

He scowled and then, suddenly, smiled.

Her eyes widened slightly before going back to her drawings, scribbling furiously.

Edward cocked an eyebrow before looking down at the sparking potato of doom. He sighed and rolled up his sleeves, ready to get to work. 


End file.
